The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga head football coach Russ Huesman highlighted the Mocs Media Luncheon in McKenzie Arena today. Members of the media heard from Huesman, senior defensive back Chaz Moore and freshman offensive lineman Corey Levin as the team prepares for this weekend’s action.

UTC travels to Georgia State in Week 2. The Mocs face the Panthers in Atlanta’s Georgia Dome on Saturday, Sept. 7 and kickoff is set for 2:00 p.m. (E.D.T.). Fans can catch the game on the Mocs Sports Network – ESPN Radio 105.1 The Zone in Chattanooga – and ESPN3.

Be sure to check out the quotes, photos and video from today’s media luncheon attached to this story. Volleyball coach Travis Filar and men’s golf coach Mark Guhne also stopped by to discuss their teams’ upcoming play.

Head Coach Russ HuesmanOpening statement:“Last week was a little disappointing. We didn’t play very well on either side of the ball, especially defensively. That’s not how we want to play defense. We gave up too many yards and didn’t get stops when we needed them. It was really disappointing. I thought our guys played hard on both sides of the ball, but we made too many mistakes. We have to get better. I think our guys will bounce back and play better this week.”

Thoughts on Georgia State:“If we don’t play better this week against Georgia State, we’ll get run out of the building. I don’t think there’s any question about that. We’re playing a talented football team. I don’t think people realize just how big and strong they are. They have some pretty big and skilled kids. And the one question they had at quarterback going in, he threw for 390 yards.”

Thoughts on Georgia State’s talent:“Georgia State is going to be better this year because there is a sense of ‘newness.’ There’s new excitement, new energy and you can see that’s how they play. They play with a lot of emotion, excitement and play hard. To me, that’s the easy part of it. It’s new and everybody is excited. If you get a new shirt, you’re excited and you want to wear it. You can tell they’ve done that. They have some good players, I don’t think there is any question about that, and they are very well coached.”

Thoughts on Georgia State vs. Samford:“I thought Samford played really well. It’s kind of what I expected. Samford is a physical team. They defend the run really well and always have. It didn’t surprise me that the yards were hard to come by on the ground, but it surprised me that they could throw the ball that well against Samford. They had some big plays, but I think Samford is just really good.”

Plan going into Saturday and preparation:“We are trying to emphasize tackling and wrapping up. We’re going to practice more players and play more players. We have a lot of players who don’t want to come out of the game, but we have to make those decisions as coaches and take players out. You could tell that we were tired. We were sliding off tackles and not wrapping up. I don’t want to say we are out of shape, but games are different and it was humid. I want it to look more like a scrimmage with the changes we’re going to make.”

Chaz Moore, Senior, Defensive BackThoughts on bouncing back from UT Martin:“We are going to motivate ourselves. We know that we had a bad game and 36 missed tackles is unacceptable. We are going to come in this week and work specifically on tackling. Georgia State is going to try to run the ball and we have to prove we can stop them.”

Thoughts on the defense:“We were one of the best defenses in the country last year. For us to give up 300 yards rushing is unacceptable. We want them to run the ball so that we can show them how we’ve improved and how good we are.”

Thoughts after the loss to UT Martin:“I felt hurt after the game. I felt like we let each other down. We weren’t clicking and it was a team let down. Saturday, I just thought about all of the mistakes and all of the plays I could have made. Now I have to learn from it.”

Corey Levin, Freshman, Offensive LinemanThoughts on the loss to UT Martin:“We had a lot of confidence going into the game and didn’t see it going the way it did. We did a lot of good things but also did a lot of bad things. I think we had some good drive that kept our offense off the field and I thought we showed that we can score quickly.”

Thoughts on his performance:“It’s hard to find positives after losses. You can have a parent tell you after the game that you played well, but it doesn’t feel like it after a loss. No matter how well individuals played, we still lost as a team. It doesn’t feel good to lose.”

On the offense going into Saturday:“We have to get a sustained drive going this week. We have to cut down on drive-killing penalties, but we need to collect first-down-after-first-down. It doesn’t matter if we don’t score on the first drive as long as we can put together a long possession.”

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